California, but sadder

*WARNING this blog goes from mild ridiculousness, to nostalgic wishfulness, to serious life appraisal. All those looking for witty banter about the worlds problems skip this post. If you don't care about my life's problems (which I don't expect you to) skip this post. Also it's all sort of stream of consciousness-y. Which is not the best or most understandable writing style, but the easiest for me to just do. So really don't feel that you have to read this. But you can. You have been warned*

If you're reading this I assume that you read my blog, which is weird to think about because apparently people do read this blog. However I'm going to keep pretending you don't read this blog so that I don't feel self conscious about ranting all the time and having the people who evidently read this blog think I'm an angry person, which I'm not, I just sometimes feel the need to rant about things that bug me and what better place to do it than on a blog that nobody reads. Right? Right. So back to my initial point, if you are reading this, which I'm assuming you're not, I'm assuming you've read my previous posts specifically the one about my spring break in California and its high levels of awesome. If you haven't read it do so now, or don't, I don't care. Anywho the moral of that story was that California is awesome and I had an epic time with no sadness involved.

This past weekish I went back to California for the marriage of Chris and Kristina. It was beautiful, but that's not the point. The point is that there was a lot more sadness this time around. Seriously even when I was happy I was sad. I really didn't understand it. I mean I was IN California, the state of my heart where I am meant to live forever. How could I be sad? I wasn't sad last time. Was Utah starting to brain wash me? There was some panic. Don't worry though I figured it out. Want to hear my conclusions? Well you get to. When I went back for Spring Break it was like a greatest hits reunion tour. Everyday was jam packed with awesomeness. Every waking hour was spent doing all the fun things that California has to offer. It was like a salve on my wounded Cali-sick heart. It showed me that all my friends still loved me, and that the state still loved me. It was perfect because thats what it was planned to be.

This time around it wasn't like that. Every minute wasn't planned. It was like I was living my old life again. Like I had spent the last year on pause and someone had finally gotten around to un-pausing me. I spent everyday just doing things that I did when I lived there. Going to campus, chilling with my old dorm buddies, chilling at an apartment, strolling through Westwood. And I realized that it felt so right doing all those things, but also kind of wrong. Because the thing about being paused for a year is that when the big hand from above hits play you don't feel like you missed anything, but you did. Everyone else has spent the last year living while you've been frozen. Things change, not drastically, but enough. Enough that I had to realize that LA California is not my life anymore. Everyone there who knew me still knows me, and loves me, and welcomes me back with open arms, and its great but not the same. I'm a visitor. To them I'm a temporary distraction and to me they're what I want my life to still be. It's no ones fault. It's just how life goes. I'm sure it's happened with some of my friends from high school. The difference is I don't care about my high school life. That ended, I was glad, I let go and moved on. I haven't moved on from California yet. My life in California is still something I want and crave. It's like that stupid ex you just can't get over because nothing else has measured up yet. You think you've gotten over it but everything is compared to that ideal. And then you realize that you're life has been in a holding pattern, but what can you do?

This weekend was the realization. And hopefully it will help me to get over California. Hopefully I will stop waiting for things to be just as good as they were in California. Things in Utah are always going to be different, but does that mean worse? Does that mean I have to just keep waiting for California style living? NO! No it does not. So from this day forward I start getting involved in my life. Or something like that. At the very least I hope that I can be ok with the fact that Utah is not California, and that California is not waiting for me.

Sorry that got a little heavy into the where my life is going, and all my problems and that. But this is something I had to work through, or some cheesy junk like that, and I promise that my next post will be both light and witty.

Driving Woes

Let me preface this airing of grievances by saying that this blog is not about my feelings toward my newly acquired car Joan Jetta (if you get why this name is incredibly clever let me know because you get an automatic spot on my awesome person list.) I love Joan and I like to think that she loves me. So don't think this is me being mad at my super cute car.

Shall we begin? Yes? Good. So I believe that there is a system for driving on highways in Utah, and by highways I mean I-15, because what else is there. I-15 has either three or four lanes. The right side lane is for the slow people, the left side lane is for people who think they are in the Indy-500. I like sticking to the middle lanes. I feel at home there going 5-10 miles over the 65 speed limit. So something that really gets me mad is when people don't respect this system.

Example number one, when someone decides to ride my tail when there is no traffic on either side of me. I'm cruising along between 70 an 77 miles an hour in my friendly middle lane and some car, usually either a ridiculously large truck or a shiny sports car come speeding up behind me and then slows down and continues cruising like 3 inches away from my bumper despite the fact that the left and right lanes are wide open. Seriously bro? Just change lanes. Your type belong in the left lane anyway. I'm going a respectable speed and if you don't like it move. I mean I try and be courteous, if I'm in the left lane and I see approaching cars I move over. So why can't these D-bags juts merge into the available space?

Next, if you have cruise control use it. I hate it when one minute a car going 85 races pulls in front of me and then 15 seconds later they've slowed down to 60 mph, and then when you start getting close to them they speed off in a huff. My speed ain't changing pal, its you, so there is no reason to get offended. Stay at a constant speed. Please.

If you merge unnecessarily into spaces where you have no business merging. I hate you. Everyone hates you. This isn't a spy movie, and I highly doubt that dangerous merging is going to get you anywhere much faster.On a similar note, use your friggin blinker. It's there for a reason. No one in Utah signals and it makes me want to hit a wall.

Thats about it for now. I guess it boils down to this, if people would stop driving like they have a pregnant woman bleeding out from a gunshot wound in their front seat the highways would be a happier place for everyone.

Righteous Indignation

I am a Mormon. Many a time in recent years, especially since I've moved away from home I have found myself wondering if I'm LDS because I believe its the truest religion or if its because I was raised in Utah County and feel a strong sense of social pressure to be Mormon that I can't escape. For those of you scoffing right now try spending 18 years in Mapleton and the tell me you don't feel a little brain washed. For the most part however I have decided that I do believe in the church, most of the time. Sometimes the general authorities say things and I think, no, nope, no, I don't believe that, and I never will. I'm not a sheep, and if that sends me to hell so be it. I won't get into all the points where the church and I disagree. I don't like discussing religion, or politics. My beliefs is my beliefs and I don't need your approval, and you don't need mine. However, I got some church related news tonight and I feel the need to voice or more actually type my anger, cuz I be pissed.

So apparently the general authorities decided, with no warning by the way, to cancel the morority/fraternity program. In fact they got rid of the whole IWA/IMA program. And I am mad as hell. I know this might seem weird. I've always kind of mocked myself for joining the morority, and in the final months of my first year in I was kind of doubting my commitment to the whole thing. But now that it's gone I'm mad. Because if I'm completely honest with myself without Upsilon my year would have been a fatty mess. It was in the morority that I final found friends. It was after joining that I decided I didn't have to move back to California even if it meant being an exotic dancer to pay the bills. It shrunk the huge number of nameless faceless people at the University of Utah to a small group of girls who were a lot like me. And the connection was quick. It made finding a whole new group of friends far less intimidating. Basically, in the mushiest terms possible, the girls I met in Upsilon were my life preserver. Without them I might have drowned. And now the church has decided, with no clear reason, that this program isn't something they want around. And I am not ok with it.

I don't know why this happened, but I have my suspicions. The church just reorganized all the singles wards in Utah. They are expanding most of the wards and being very strict about everybody going to their ward and ONLY their ward. So basically what I've gathered is that the church wants all young adults to get married as soon as possible. But instead of giving us a lot of options that will allow really sort through all the candidates and find someone who is really right for us as an individual they want us to choose from one of the 150 guys in the one singles ward we are assigned to. Apparently they think if we just date our way through the singles ward we're bound to find someone we can put up with forever. To me it just seems hugely hypocritical. They are telling guys to date and girls to get out there and all this stuff and yet they are tearing apart an institution that helps people find each other in smaller settings. They want us married but only if we do it their way.

Which brings me another problem I have that is connected to this whole dating/sorority/singles ward thang. The general authorities need to get with the times. It's not 1950 anymore. I mean sure, it would be super keen if a guy would take me on a date to the movies in my poodle skirt, and then after three dates he would give me his class ring and we would be "going steady" and then 2 months later we would get married. But that just isn't how it works anymore. First I don't even know anybody with a class ring, or even a letterman's jacket for that matter. More importantly dating is expensive so I understand if a guy wants to get to know a girl and really decide if he is interested before taking her out. Also being friends is a great way to start a relationship, and the sororities/frats give the YSAs a great way to meet one another in a low pressure way. We make friends, some people find lovers, urbody leaves happy. Another thing I don't plan on being a housewife and I also don't plan on marrying a guy after three months of dating. No thanks, not my style, never going to happen. I'm not just going to marry the first dude who seems nice and can provide for me and my 2.5 kids and our dog Rover. Things have changed. The nation wide average age of marriage is 28. So maybe the head honchos should just chill the frak out, and let us single adults figure out our crap instead of trying to force us into an early and unhappy marriage.

In conclusion, I'm pissed, I want my sorority back, I'm writing this exceptionally tired and I want to hit something. Oh and if this doesn't get me sent straight to hell, well then I'm sitting pretty.

Gabby "Fat Dog" Swensen

Gabby "Fat Dog" Swensen

1998-2011

Gabby Swensen, known fondly as Fat Dog or Gabriotta Poop- a-Lotta, joined so many other good and faithful doggy companions at the great toilet bowl in the sky on May 28th 2011. She was freed from this word of arthritic pain, partial deafness, and breathing problems at the hands of a kind and gentle veterinarian. She lived to be a full 13 or 91 in dog years. She will be missed.

Some say that dog is man's best friend, but to the Swensen household, or at least me, she was so much more than that. She was family. She was always there, part of who we were. Hiking trips just weren't the same without her bounding along side you, sniffing out all the interesting smells. The back yard wasn't the backyard with out countless mounds of her doggy doo and discarded tennis balls worn down from hours of fetch. Watching TV just didn't seem right if she wasn't there sniffing around, begging for attention. Latter in her life a night in front of the tv wasn't the same without her rather loud, human-like snoring. For the last 13 years Gabby has always been there to poke her nose at guests where guests usually don't want dog noses poked, to lick all the cuts on my hands, and to try and sneak out the front door if you opened it more than about 3 inches. She was there to see me laugh and to see me cry. She really was an extrodinary animal and I'm going to miss her so so much.

Knowing that it was her time to go, that she was in too much pain for life to be good, and that she's in a better place doesn't make this easier. It never makes things easier. It still feels like something important is missing, like something is never going to be the same. It hurts. But she's in a better place (she's in a better place she's in a better place) and that shall be my mantra. I love her so I am ok with her going out of this world, but she'll never go out of my heart.

Rest in Peace Gabby, you'll always be my puppy.

Reasons I wasn't Raptured

So apparently I didn't make the first cut of people who were sucked into heaven through God's crazy straw. Quite honestly I wasn't at all surprised. But for those of you who are super shocked that an honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous being like me didn't get raptured, here's the reason I didn't get all raptured.

The Depraved Scrabble Society*

*For those of you not comfortable with horrible and/or racist and/or sexual words or who hold the rules of Scrabble as holy script please look no further. These images might be too much for you to bear.

Round 1, two bags of tile, and no rules.

Round 2, just the one bag, but the words were a little worse I think.

I mean if spelling out these horrible words and then laughing about it isn't enough to leave me earth bound I'm pretty sure that breaking the scared rules of scrabble definitely is. So thanks to my love of dirty words with horrible spellings on triple word score I am going to be here on earth for the end of days, and sent to hell for the post end of days. Unless of course that whole thing was a bust, in which case I hope to be long dead and happily situated in hell playing depraved scrabble with the devil for the actual end of days.

My Life Philosophy

Ladies and Gentlemen, after 20 years of living I finally have it. I have a life philosophy. I have a view, and guiding thought, that steers my actions and many aspects of my life. It's not wordy or flashy but (unlike this lead up) simple and clean. It is this: boys are stupid, girls are crazy. Now before you judge take a minute and let it sink in. Wait for it... BAM! It just hit you didn't it. The genius and utter truthiness just hit you like a ton of bricks I'm sure. Still uncertain? Well think back on all of your past relationships (as in the boyfriend girlfriend type) and then think about why they ended. I bet it was because the boy was stupid, the girl was crazy or some horrible combination of the two. Don't over analyze things, just be honest with yourself. Here, to help you out I'll do mine, in order, separated by commas. Stupid, it turns out I was dating a woman with a penis so his crazy stupidity, stupid with a sprinkle of crazy, crazy, stupid, and crazy with a liberal dash of stupid. Ok, now think of fights you've had with friends of both the same and opposite sexes, and I bet you find at their root crazy or stupid accordingly.

You're still not convinced? Fine, here are some actual situational examples. Girls how often have you sat watching a movie next to the guy you like and spent the entire movie sitting with your hand awkwardly sitting three inches away from your thigh land not had the guy hold your hand even though his friend told your friend who told you that he totally digs you? Your information chain isn't flawed, he's just a guy and therefore stupid. Guys how many times has a lady been mad at you, but she won't tell you why and then later you find out its because you didn't notice she cut her hair 1/8 of an inch? Or something equally ridiculous. It's just cuz she's crazy. There are countless numbers of things that prove my point. Take a minute and you'll see I'm right.

I'm sure you're all now thinking "Jessica if you've figured this whole thing out does that mean you're free and you're relationship pathway is now clear and problem free?" The answer is, yes and no. It's yes because I don't get as upset anymore. A guy doesn't hold my hand or realize that I'm just not interested after several terse text messages with horribly vague excuses? Well he's a male, and thus stupid, so I'll keep on keeping on and hold off my Ben and Jerry's binge a bit longer. Instead of being crazy and thinking if my blank was just blank I'm sure he would like me, I can tell myself he's stupid and move on. I can also objectively see my actions and try and put a lid on my crazy. The answer is no because I'm still a female and sadly still crazy. For example say I'm thinking of maybe liking a guy, even though he lives about an hour and a half away most of the time, and I haven't heard from him in a couple days. Rationally I know that he was going camping some time soon and that's probably where he is, and he's not blowing me off or anything, and yet... there's this stupid crazy little voice in the back of my mind that is absolutely sure that despite throwing boulder sized hints of his interest at me he's just a player and a flirt who's used me ill and I should head for the freezer section of the grocery store. Yeah, it's ridiculous. I'm a little disgusted at myself, but I'm still a female and so this crazy nagging is just something I must live with.

The moral of the story? You can't change the fact that you are crazy or stupid. You can however be aware of your fault and try to keep away from the chocolate syrup or whatever the male equivalent of ice cream is. Living by this philosophy also eliminates a lot of the frustration I feel towards people. A few deep breaths while repeating the mantra, girls are crazy, guys are stupid and I'm right as rain. So my friends take this information, use it, and be at peace, for you too now know the secret of life.

Think of the Children

Growing up in Utah has provided me with a unique perspective on child bearing and rearing. Basically, I don't know how babies are made, but I do know that if I don't start making them by age 21 my inside parts explode and God frowns upon me. Not really, but kind of. Anyway the point of this is not to frown upon Utah's lack of sex education program, which I do, or to comment on the Utah County Mormon ideology that women are baby factories. Instead I would like to judge another horrible Utah County-ism which is ridiculous baby names. I don't know who people think they are but during my 18 years there, and my mothers years of being a teacher I have heard of some pretty whacky and by whacky I mean horrible, names. So I've come up with some guidelines for naming your baby.

1. Do not name your child after your things found in nature. Examples: Rainy (her last name was Peirson pronounced person, poor child), Echo, River, Forest (all in the same family), ChiaDee( pronounced shady, last name Woods, middle name Lane), and Boulder, just to name a few. They started in nature and thats where they should stay.
2. Do not name your child after anything that is your favorite. For instance math function- Matrix, Movie title-Matrix(I don't know where it fits), car- Hummer, animal-Bronco, article of clothing- Fedora and Capri, both went to my high school, fabric pattern-Paisley. Put it on a bumper sticker and save your child the humiliation that comes from being named after something people wear on their heads.
3. If you think it sounds like something a movie star would name their child, just say no. The world only needs one Apple that's not edible.
4. City names are bad. They already have a whole city, they don't need your child too. Examples, Denver, Boston, Capri(a double whammy), London, Aspen. Also it will lead to awkward questions about conception later on in life that could and should be avoided.
5. Really weird spellings are just out. And I don't mean adding two e's where a y should be like Bailee or Courtnee, or flopping/deleting letters. I mean naming your kid Alison and spelling it Alycesun. Yeah, that really happened. Or Kwincy, Q's aren't well represented enough for you to replace it with a Kw.
6. Don't put punctuation in your child's name, just don't. Alex-andra is going to have to repeat kindergarten because she couldn't spell her name and her hatred of you, her parent, will grow after every state test.

So basically if you are thinking of a name for your child and it falls into one of these categories think again. I mean seriously, this kid is going to have this name for the rest of his or her life. Be kind, and never name your child rewind.